Death's End

Gravity, as the only Solar System ship capable of interstellar flight, immediately began to pursue Blue Space. Trisolaris brought up the idea of sending a speedy droplet—formally, it was called a strong-interaction space probe—to pursue and destroy Blue Space. But Earth unequivocally refused. From humanity’s perspective, Blue Space should be dealt with as a matter of internal affairs. The Doomsday Battle was humanity’s greatest wound, and after more than a decade, the pain had not lessened one whit. Permitting another droplet attack on humans was absolutely politically unacceptable. Even though the crew of Blue Space had become aliens in the minds of most people, only humanity should bring them to justice.

Out of consideration for the ample time that remained before Blue Space could become a threat, Trisolaris acquiesced. However, Trisolaris emphasized that, since Gravity possessed the ability to broadcast via gravitational waves, its security was a matter of life and death for Trisolaris. Therefore, droplets would be sent as escorts, but would also ensure an overwhelming advantage against Blue Space.

Thus, Gravity cruised in formation with two droplets a few thousand meters away. The contrast between the sizes of the two ship types couldn’t be greater. If one pulled back far enough to see the entirety of Gravity, the droplets would be invisible. And if one pulled close enough to a droplet to observe it, its smooth surface would clearly reflect an image of Gravity.

Gravity was built about a decade after Blue Space. Other than the gravitational wave antenna, it was not significantly more advanced. Its propulsion systems, for example, were only slightly more powerful than Blue Space’s. Gravity’s confidence in the success of their hunt was due to their overwhelming advantage in fuel reserves.

Even so, based on the ships’ current velocities and accelerations, it would take fifty years for Gravity to catch Blue Space.

Deterrence Era, Year 61 The Swordholder

Cheng Xin gazed up at her star from the top of a giant tree. It was why she had been awakened.

During the brief life of the Stars Our Destination Project, a total of fifteen individuals were granted ownership of seventeen stars. Other than Cheng Xin, the other fourteen owners were lost to history, and no legal heirs could be located. The Great Ravine acted like a giant sieve, and too many did not make it through. Now, Cheng Xin was the only one who held legal title to a star.

Though humanity still hadn’t begun to reach for any star beyond the Solar System, the rapid pace of technological progress meant that stars within three hundred light-years of the Earth were no longer of mere symbolic value. DX3906, Cheng Xin’s star, turned out to have planets after all. Of the two planets discovered so far, one seemed very similar to Earth based on its mass, orbit, and a spectrum analysis of its atmosphere. As a result, its value rose to stratospheric heights. To everyone’s surprise, they discovered that this star already had an owner.

The UN and the Solar System Fleet wanted to reclaim DX3906, but this couldn’t be done legally unless the owner agreed to transfer the title. Thus Cheng Xin was awakened from her slumber after 264 years of hibernation.

The first thing she found out after emerging from hibernation was this: As she had expected, there was no news whatsoever about the Staircase Program. The Trisolarans had not intercepted the probe, and they had no idea of its whereabouts. The Staircase Program had been forgotten by history, and Tianming’s brain was lost in the vastness of space. But this man, this man who had merged into nothingness, had left a real, solid world for his beloved, a world composed of a star and two planets.

A Ph.D. in astronomy named 艾 AA{Translator’s Note: This is a name written in a mix of Chinese characters and English letters. The “艾” is the surname and is pronounced “Ai.”} had discovered the planets around DX3906. As part of her dissertation, AA had developed a new technique that used one star as a gravitational lens through which to observe another.

To Cheng Xin, AA resembled a vivacious bird fluttering around her nonstop. AA told Cheng Xin that she was familiar with people like her, who had come from the past—known as “Common Era people” after the old calendar—since her own dissertation advisor was a physicist from back then. Her knowledge of Common Era people was why she had been appointed as Cheng Xin’s liaison from the UN Space Development Agency as her first job after her doctorate.